First Take
by stanzaic
Summary: The game is never perfect after one take. This is the first take of the ending of Shadow at the Water's Edge. Be careful: dancing monkeys, spoilers, and implied SAW-bashing included here!


There was only one thing left for Nancy Drew to do. Wait, no, there were a lot of things left for her to do. She always had one more thing on her to-do list, which, by the way, she didn't even have any control over. How stupid was that?

Anyway, Nancy found herself wandering around in a bathroom or wherever she was (the corridors were confusing, okay?) and saw a broken doll on the floor. Or a mannequin. "Whoa," Nancy said aloud, snapping her gum and walking over to examine the phenom. "Phenom's not a word. But this looks like what Rentaro was working on earlier!"

The Jaws theme began to issue from the nearest air vent. Nancy ignored this phenom – er, phenomenon, and left the room, leaving the broken wooden doll thingy lying randomly on the floor. It was sure to frighten the daylights out of whatever customer happened to come along next. But hey, where was she going to put it? It wasn't like she had a bottomless pit of a purse/backpack/satchel/thingummy where mysterious objects constantly appeared (usually a quarter).

Nancy proceeded to try to find her way back to Rentaro's outhouse-looking hut-thing. There was never a name given to it, so why not call it that? That was the way Nancy saw it, in any case, and after wandering for a couple of hours around all the halls that looked exactly the same compared to each other, Nancy found the little garden.

"It's about time," Nancy snapped, hurrying toward the outhouse-looking hut-thing. Unsurprisingly Rentaro was not inside. What did you think this was, the end of the game? No, things must be far more complicated than that! Mayhaps there's another pointless puzzle thrown in – does Sudoku on an underwater treasure chest ring any bells? By the way, what the heck kind of pirate would know what Sudoku was!

"Oh, look," Nancy said robotically, reaching for the recorder. "A little recording device. And ghostly sounds are issuing from it. Oh dear." Nancy swiftly switched her recording device with the one stuck in the machine. "Yay for me!" Nancy praised herself as she picked up a conveniently located pink sticky-note. No thought of how only stupid criminals left behind their evidence reached her mind; no, she was too interested in catching Rentaro to think about that. Maybe some dancing monkeys were running around her brain trying to hide the plot hole.

Um, yeah.

Nancy translated the pink sticky-note with her handy-dandy translation book, and although this lovely trip was the first time she'd ever even seen Japanese writing, she was catching on very quickly. Something that would have taken others many long years she'd gotten on practically her first day! But Nancy didn't think about that Mary Sue quality of hers – no, instead, she saw _must finish today!_ and Room 33 on the sticky-note. What idiot criminal left sticky-notes like this lying around inside an outhouse?

The amateur detective (what a stupid title, obviously Nancy Drew is not an amateur at all, she _did_ solve an underwater Sudoku puzzle on a pirate chest) hurried to Room 33. It did take her quite some time to find the room, but because time lapses strangely in this game – uh, in Japan, hardly five minutes had passed by the time Nancy reached Room 33.

"Here's Nancy!" Nancy yelled, shoving open the door. She realized that she had very conveniently grabbed the Door-O-Matic. Wait, why the hell had Rentaro left the freaking Door-O-Matic - ! Argh, in any case, Nancy busted down the door with a ninja kick and then she was in the room.

Yeah.

Rentaro, surprisingly, did not notice Nancy when she clicked into the room in her high heels. He continued to wander around with a monkey wrench, and from time to time, he would try and fiddle with the monkey wrench and the wall. Nancy wasn't sure how that was working, as there was nothing for the monkey wrench to latch onto, but hey, he looked all criminal-like, didn't he?

"What're you doing in here? You're the one trying to scare everyone away, aren't you."

Rentaro whirled around. "Nancy Drew! What are _you_ doing here! How did you find me!" He paused. "Argh, cut the crap! What makes you think _I'm_ the villain?"

Nancy pointed at her script.

Rentaro cleared his throat. "Oh, um, yes. I mean, so what if that was a total assumption and you really don't know anything at all? The ryokan needs to close down." Rentaro struck a sassy gay friend pose.

After snapping a quick picture with her cell phone and forwarding it to all the people in her Contacts list, including Rentaro, Nancy exclaimed, "But why would you want to close this place down? You have zero motivation!"

"I know," Rentaro sighed. "But we're not following the script, are we! The director will be pissed! Ahem, I mean, look around you! Does this _look_ like a good place? Everyone can sense it immediately, and it makes them leave. Everyone but _you_!"

"Uh…everyone can sense what?"

"What?"

"You kind of never finished your thought."

"…oh…but when I tell Miwako that you're here to collect info for Savannah's next book – you'll be out of here too."

Nancy was too busy looking at the ceiling to listen to the threat. Rentaro had been pointing randomly up at the ceiling. Nancy stared at the ceiling for a while. "What's up there?" she asked. "Why were you pointing at the ceiling? What has it ever done to you?"

Then she quickly said for no apparent reason, "I've got to find a way to keep him from escaping!"

There was a good full two minutes. Rentaro looked at Nancy with his eyebrows raised. "Well?" he asked, "Aren't you going to do it? Aren't you going to make some horrifically amazing deduction and trap me in here and keep me from escaping?"

"Oh, yeah," Nancy said. She clicked the Door-O-Matic at the door and it swung shut. Rentaro ran at the door as if Nancy had closed a Justin Bieber poster behind it. "Not so fast!" Nancy hesitated. "Wait – there's a freakin' doorknob!"

"Shh!" Rentaro hissed frantically over his shoulder. "I'll pretend it's locked!"

"Okay!" Nancy agreed, randomly dumping the contents of her purse/backpack/satchel/thingummy on the coffee table. "I've got to find a way to convince everyone about Rentaro, quickly!"

"Um, you have me trapped in here," Rentaro said, turning back around. "What's the deal with the quickly crap?"

"I…don't know." Nancy picked up the voice recorder slowly, pressing one of the buttons. "Um, why don't I just call Miwako and put Rentaro on speaker? Oh well. Uh, so, Rentaro…feel like confessing?"

Rentaro walked back over, hands shoved in his pockets. And some dancing monkeys filled Nancy's mind again, because Rentaro's monkey wrench had vanished. Nancy prompted again, "I don't get it, you're the one who told me the ghosts aren't real."

"No one usually listens to that line, because they _want_ to believe in the ghosts. I didn't start that – they did. They wanted a show – and I gave it to them, because enough with them! And enough of this place. I asked Miwako to leave. I even left myself!"

"Uh…why don't you knock me out and take the Door-O-Matic?"

Rentaro looked surprised. "I don't know, why don't I?"

Nancy looked down at her script. Whoops, wrong line. "Um…why did you come back?"

"I can't leave Miwako here alone, I need to convince her to leave or close this place down. It doesn't matter to me. But you, it's time that you leave. _Now_."

"You are in no place to threaten me, I'm the main character! Besides, I just recorded you! I hit one very convenient button and BAM! Everybody's got the message!"

"No! Don't!"

"Why shouldn't I, after everything you've done? Your ghost almost drowned me!"

"It did?" Rentaro looked momentarily confused. He shook his head and continued the argument. "I really screwed up here. Let me be the one to tell her. If _I_ do, she might be able to forgive me…eventually."

And because Nancy was mildly Mary Sue, because dancing monkeys covered the plot holes with some epic do-si-dos, because Rentaro was not a real criminal by any real criminal standards, the mystery was solved.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** Well, that's what I thought of that ending. xP If you loved this game so much you feel like throttling me right now, don't. And don't flame me. Kthxbye.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own this.

***EDIT January 2014:** Yeah, I did not think this needed to be mentioned, but don't steal this and post it on HerInteractive. Or anywhere. I forgot I wrote this ridiculous old thing until I found it posted by someone else, claiming it as their own, in a kids' forum. I posted this here for a reason, friends, because it does not go on HerInteractive. Stealing is shitty; don't be a thief. I'm looking at you, Lumos of HerInteractive. I'm looking at you.


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